Centrelink’s automated debt recovery system and its policies of coercion and confusion are causing significant distress to many disadvantaged Australians, the Vice-President of the Australian Association of Social Workers, Christine Craik, said today.
“People look to their government for support, not intimidation,” Ms Craik said.
What stops most middle class people from committing fraud – say, by claiming false expenses, making dodgy tax claims or exaggerating their assets to a bank – is thought to be a calculus of the risk of being caught and the extent of public disgrace if one is caught. By contrast, politicians seem to assume that underclass and working class fraud, like other crimes, including violence, being committed by them is deterred only by the severity of jail sentences.
The theory might be wrong, at least as far as welfare fraud is concerned.
The current Centrelink debt fiasco is, sadly, measuring up as a human disaster. There are now too many frightening examples of letters and subsequent poor treatment of individuals trying to prove their innocence.
The government’s horrific start to the year is not only fully deserved, it is completely appropriate. The Centrelink shemozzle and entitlements abuses are a wonderful amalgam of the absence of respect for those on welfare and the tin-eared political nous which characterises this government.
Let’s not pretend that Centrelink issuing faulty debt notices is just a case of IT gone wrong.
Faults where people are issued debt notices of $14,000 due to the system incorrectly duplicating employers, or because it hamfistedly averages annual income over 52 weeks are not really IT glitches, but rather are part of the policy design.
Centrelink, the Australian Tax Office and the government are overseeing another cock-up the magnitude of the online Census shutdown.
Imagine if we sent the debt collectors in for overpayments to politicians for questionable travel expenses to footy matches.
The mess created by the Australian Government's bid to automate the search for people who are cheating on their welfare entitlements shows no sign of disappearing, with ministers standing by the methods used.
These methods have been shown to be generating false positives by many media organisations but the government refuses to budge.
The view of many is that this is typical political behaviour: make a mistake and then refuse to own up to it.
But a different theory appears to be more logical: Malcolm Turnbull and his ministers are refusing to budge because they want a situation of this kind to exist.
Vinnies has joined the chorus of welfare organisations demanding the government suspend the Centrelink debt recovery system, saying it should not be viewed as a “weapon” of deficit reduction.
Policies that mitigate the stress of poverty and promote mental health would more effectively reduce the welfare burden than scaring individuals into paying back debts they're unlikely to have.
Some Centrelink recipients that have been targeted in the department's new debt recovery endeavour are finding themselves in severe financial stress, with some looking at taking out a payday loan to get by. Speaking to the Herald Sun, Centrelink recipient Michael Bond said issues relating to debt recovery were affecting his Medicare payments. He and his family, who reside in Melbourne, are owed $500.
IT appears it will be some time before anyone from Centrelink or the Turnbull Government admits it, but Centrelink’s effort to recover “debt” from tens of thousands of welfare recipients has been poorly conceived and executed.
Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, Human Services Minister Alan Tudge was yesterday continuing to insist that “the system is working”.
